What to expect in Day Z, for players new and old

[Icus 24]

So you're playing one of the most epic, hardcore, and exciting zombie games out there. But are you prepared for the unforgiving world of Chernarus?

The first thing you need to do to prepare yourself is realize DayZ is in ALPHA right now. There's a reason very few games have open Alphas. You know how Betas are often buggy, unstable and prone to rapid iteration (ie quick changes/fixes/nerfs/buffs)? Well, Alphas, by virtue of the game not yet being ready for beta, are worse.

There's a reason a simple hotfix breaks tents. It's because it's Alpha. When people complain about fixing bugs before implementing new features, they are failing to understand the purpose of Alpha. The point of Alpha is not to get the game playable, it's to assemble its skeleton. Stabilization etc. comes in Beta.

Day Z is remarkably stable, and fun, at present (for an Alpha) so it's easy to get spoiled. Just remember when something breaks, the devs know, and they will get to fixing it, but shouting at them about how "fixing all bugs should come before implementing anything new!!!!" is not what they need to hear. Besides, even if they did do that, implementing a new feature could very well introduce just as many bugs as before. This would slow development to a crawl, and while you might be happy with your tent city in the middle of nowhere with more duped guns than anyone could possibly ever use, I can't wait to see how they expand this harsh, unforgiving world.

[Allie (DayZ) 97]

Very nice said.

[SmashT 10907]

Realise this is not a fully fledged game, it is an alpha build of a mod, that despite having over a million players has only been in development for a few months, it had no funding and was almost entirely coded by a single person on an engine that was never designed for a game like this, there are lots of bugs, exploits and cheaters, many of which can not fixed at all while it remains a mod, despite this DayZ is still incredibly fun, take it for what it is and you will enjoy it.

Expect to die a lot, the game has a steep learning curve at the beginning but is very rewarding once you figure it out.

Edited August 15, 2012 by smasht_AU